Vulnerability Discussion

If RHEL 8 allows the user to select passwords based on dictionary words, this increases the chances of password compromise by increasing the opportunity for successful guesses, and brute-force attacks.

Check

Verify RHEL 8 prevents the use of dictionary words for passwords.

Determine if the field "dictcheck" is set with the following command:

$ sudo grep -r dictcheck /etc/security/pwquality.conf*

/etc/security/pwquality.conf:dictcheck=1

If the "dictcheck" parameter is not set to "1", or is commented out, this is a finding.
If conflicting results are returned, this is a finding.

Fix

Configure RHEL 8 to prevent the use of dictionary words for passwords.

Add or update the following line in the "/etc/security/pwquality.conf" file or a configuration file in the /etc/pwquality.conf.d/ directory to contain the "dictcheck" parameter:

dictcheck=1